Downtown railyard plan inches forward

Jul. 23, 2013

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A public meeting is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Aug. 14 at the Sioux Falls Convention Center.

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Almost eight years after Congress approved $40 million to remove the railyard in Sioux Falls, officials say they’re close to completing the environmental study that would allow them to move forward.

A draft version of the environmental assessment was made available Monday by the city, and Monday also started a 45-day public comment period on the project, which has taken years and morphed considerably since 2005. Any public comments will be included in the final environmental assessment, which then will be forwarded to the Federal Highway Administration for approval. That approval is necessary before federal funds can be tapped to use on the project.

“It’s a significant milestone reached with this project,” Public Works Director Mark Cotter said.

But even federal approval is no guarantee the project will get done. The city and BNSF Railway also must reach agreement on the value of the railyard. BNSF spokeswoman Amy McBeth said in an email Monday that the project was continuing to move forward.

When the study originally started, officials were exploring new bridge designs near Falls Park that would enable trains to get in and out of the city without a downtown switching yard. There were options of building a new rail-yard in the northeast. But some residents in Brandon objected to alternatives that would have placed the new railyard closer to them.

Another option involved building a siding — or another piece of parallel track — in southern Sioux Falls. That would have allowed the railway to transfer engines from one end of a train to the other. But that option also met opposition from residents in neighborhoods near the rail line.

Thanks to a combination of technical challenges, public opposition to various proposals and bureaucratic bungling, the project appeared to be all but dead last year. Then BNSF came forward with the prospect that it could sell the land to the city and not require a new switching yard. That became the preferred alternative in the environmental assessment.

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It includes building a siding in northeast Sioux Falls, as well as maintaining some track in downtown. Thus, it doesn’t eliminate all of the downtown switching activity, and the main lines through Sioux Falls also would remain in place.

But it would free up 10 acres for possible redevelopment.

There are other challenges. The environmental assessment notes that there are varying levels of polluted soil at the site. The South Dakota Department of Environment and Natural Resources will require that the top six inches of topsoil be removed and disposed of. Cotter said the city would replace it with clean top soil, and then seed it with vegetation until it’s ready for development. Once the city sells a piece for development, the buyer will have to have it studied for pollution and remediated if necessary.

Still, said Jeff Scherschligt, the CEO of Howalt-McDowell Insurance and a promoter of downtown development, the land is valuable. Some plans call for it to be filled in with more office buildings, along with parking. Scherschligt, who is in the planning stages of building a second Cherapa Place, thinks over the long term, the demand to work, live and shop in downtown will increase.

Much of the land’s value, he added, is in space for parking. Those parking areas are ideally situated to the development that will continue along the Big Sioux River.

“I think the big issue with this is it does free up land long term, and this community is going to continue to grow,” Scherschligt said.